Spender, Saver or Investor: Which one are you?

Spender, Saver or Investor
Which one are you?

There were three siblings who inherited a sum of  ₱300,000 from the sale of a small parcel of land, which their deceased parents left to them. They agreed to divide the money, and all take equal share then left.

The first one is Jojo, the eldest of the three. Upon receiving the money, he imagined a lot of things he can buy and do with it. He immediately went to the nearest department store and buy all the things he wanted: new clothes, new shoes, new pants, new cellphone, new computer and splurge himself on that very day. The next day, he woke up with all the things he bought the previous day and found out that all the money he got was spent to the last penny. 

The second child is Julius, quite a bit of a saver. He is afraid to take risk and always on the safe side. Since he don’t know what to do yet with the money, he immediately went to the bank the other day. He has a friend working in the bank and he approached him. To maximize the interest of the money, he wanted to avail the time deposit which will give his money the 5% interest rate. And so he deposited all his money in the bank.

The third child is Don, a business minded person and quite a risk taker. From the start the he held the money on his palm, he already knew what he needed to do. He wanted to start up his own business and invest the rest  to maximize the profit and give him the best return. He approached successful business minded friends for advise and how they started up and friends who also invested their money, whats the best investment and why, his friends shared their experiences and best practices but also warned him of the possible risk as well. As they said, Everything is a Risk nowadays. Even doing nothing is a risk, if you follow the successful and practice the right attitude you can get twice or even more from your start up capital. If not, you can always put your money in the bank and hope 5% is enough for your future. Don understood and knew the risk and agreed on it.

Past forward, it’s been 30 years since the three siblings receive their ₱100,000 each from the sale of the small parcel of land they inherited from their parents.

Jojo, as expected turned out to be the poorest among them. He spent all the money he got 30 years ago and now living in a day time job with a very small income. Sometimes not enough to support his family of two.

Julius, the second child and a saver decided to go to the bank and check his money. He finally have something in mind to buy and he needed the money for it. His friend is still working on that bank and he approached him. He told him he wanted to withdraw all his money and close the account. His friend then search their computer system and see how much his money is after 30 years of long term deposit in the bank. To his surprise  he was informed by his friend that the ₱100,000 that he deposited 30 years ago was already  ₱432,000. However, there was a 20% tax on this kind of transaction. So from ₱432,000  he now have ₱370,000 after 30 years. He is not rich, still working his day job but have enough money for his expenses and able to support his family.

The third sibling Don, who started up his own business and invested his money is doing very well. During that time, their ups and downs in the market with some years even have negative growth. But due to his consistent investing on his personal growth and learning not only on different business,  overall,  his money grew yearly with average rate of 15%. Now, his total money is  ₱6.6 million. Don was so happy to know that he has millions of cash from the ₱100,000 he initially invested 30 years ago.

Spender, Saver and Investor. Which one are you now? Are you saving wisely for the future or spending all that you have for today?

>> 3 Years ago, Like most employees i was also financially struggling. Over worked, stressed and with no savings under my belt until i found a Money making Machine called GFI. Not only was i able to resigned from my work because of GFI, it gave me an opportunity to have more quality time with my family and secure my kids future as well.

If your interested to know more about GFI, just visit my Facebook page, add me and send me a PM and let me share to you "possibly" the greatest opportunity you'll ever do

https://www.facebook.com/dondy.gonzales

Cheers!!

Play Now then Pay Later or Pay Now then Play Later, Which one are you?

Have you ever heard of the phrase or quote  " Play now then pay later or Pay now then play later"? or to be more specific "You can pay now and play later OR you can Play now and pay later. Either way you have to pay" as per John Maxwell

This is a very common quote used in any seminars or conference specially related to financials. But what does it really mean? I can associate a word to this quote that for me leans toward "Paying now so i can play later", whats that word? "Delayed Gratification"

As per our trusted Wikipedia "Delayed Gratification" or deferred gratification is the ability to resist temptation for an immediate reward and wait for a later reward. Its the patience to wait for that greater long term reward rater than the small short term ones. 

In regards to Financial Freedom, wait whats Financial Freedom?

Again as per Wikipedia Financial Freedom is described as the state of having sufficient personal wealth to live without having to work actively for basic necessities or simply put the capability to buy or spend without looking at the price tag and having the financial security knowing there's more where that came from =)  (that's my definition anyways hehe)

Going back, Financial Freedom is the goal or dream of any person and the quote mentioned above directly affects our Financial Freedom. How? Its the choices we make in the process that affect the end goal which is Financial Freedom. Simply put most people would rather "Play it now then Pay it later, for example, buying "stuffs" (gadgets,shoes) taking that vacation, parties and such then Paying for it afterwards with greater Time and effort. While "some"  will "Pay it now, then Play later". these are the people who will save and invest now, instead of buying that new phone or taking that short vacation so that in the long run they can get that house or that dream car.

I have met a lot of people who have chosen to "Pay now" and share these characteristics:

• Live on less than they earn
• Choose to invest and save for their long term goals

Because they are "paying now" they are going to be able to play later while  those who chose to "Play now" and while the fun lasted when its time to "Pay" its not Fun anymore =(

So how do we get to Financial Freedom? The answer lies in Savings and Investment! Now, most people will say that Savings and Investing is nearly impossible for them as their current income is not even enough. So they will put Savings and Investing on the sides for a later future when they get an "extra income" but how and when will that happen? Rather than looking down on our primary source of income, why not check a solution that's in reach but mostly overlooked.

Whats that? Our lifestyle and spending habits is one factor that we can look into and work on. If you look at our lifestyle and spending habits, its not the amount that's an issue but the "Will to save and invest" is our challenge! When a person has the "Will" to do it, then it can be done!

As i read before "Savings is not proportionate to the amount of money you earn but rather the amount of money you save from your income. As we all know, expenses is directly proportional to the amount of income that we have. The higher it is, the higher our expenses as well. In short, if we want to save, let’s take a look at how we spend our money and look for ways to decrease expenses and increase savings"

Lets look at some examples to illustrate and prove that if we have the "Will to save and invest", look at what will happen 

I know most of us drink Starbucks coffee, coming from the BPO industry, the coffee chains have been synonymous to us either for the coffee experience or for some the "status" . Assuming per order is around 200Php and you consume around 5 orders per month or even more. Instead of having this, you can change your spending habits and lets say trim down on the coffee or opt in for a more affordable coffee. Now look at this, most of the BPO employees nowadays earn 10,000 per cut off or roughly 20k in a month (give or take). Now what happens when you spend on that coffee every month that's 1000 as an expense and continue that for 12 months or 1 year that totals to 78,000Php for your coffee,  "Play now then Pay Later". Now you might say, really? who drinks that much coffee anyways! Well 9 years in the industry and Yes, people drink that much coffee (for what ever reasons) were not even taking in account those pastries consumed or lets say drinking or vices. Now i'm not saying Coffee is bad, my point is plain and simple, can you imagine what you can save and earn if you used that money wisely instead.

Now, lets say you take part of that 10k salary and instead of spending it, we chose to invest it, looking at a long term goal "Pay Now and Play Later". Lets say that investment cost 8900 and its earns exponentially every month (by the way, the figures onward are the actual figures you can earn) As any, legal and secured business, its a long term plan and as mentioned its exponential so even though the earnings at the start are at minimal in the 1 year sample it doubles, triples and continue to grow even becoming passive from an active income. That's more than 100% returns and by this time you can drink any Starbucks frap or coffee you want even at multiple times, everyday! 

How about the latest gadgets like phones and cameras? Do you really need that stuff? Is it a necessity or a luxury we try to live by today? Lets say your buying the latest phone every 3 months and it cost around 30,000php (take note that the latest Iphone actually cost around 50k). Thats 120,000php in a year compared if your already earning exponentially! Not to mention that gadgets like all liabilities, there values may go down as time goes by.  

The list of samples can go on, from shoes, clothes, bags, vices even unscheduled travels. On the other hand, what if we play it smarter and think long terms. What if think "Pay now then Play later", delayed Gratification,  this is what all rich people think and do with. What can happen to you  and what can you accomplish 5 or 10 years from now with just 2-3 years of sacrifice and disciple. Will you have that very own house or that fully paid car?

Now nobody said, getting rich and having Financial Freedom will be easy, it requires a lot of hard work and disciple but more importantly it takes "Will"

Can you sacrifice today for a better and brighter tomorrow?

If we only  practice the right money and spending habits, live by the "Pay now and Play Later"/Delayed Gratification principle then truly we can live abundantly for the years to come! 



>> 3 Years ago, Like most employees i was also financially struggling. Over worked, stressed and with no savings under my belt until i found a Money making Machine called GFI. Not only was i able to resigned from my work because of GFI, it gave me an opportunity to have more quality time with my family and secure my kids future as well.

If your interested to know more about GFI, just visit my Facebook page, add me and send me a PM and let me share to you "possibly" the greatest opportunity you'll ever do

https://www.facebook.com/dondy.gonzales

Cheers!!

6 Tips for Making It Work as a Part-Time Entrepreneur

6 Tips for Making It Work as a Part-Time Entrepreneur

You know you want to start a business, but you can’t shake those financial pressures — rent or a mortgage, a car payment and maybe you have kids. Even young people have responsibilities after all. But tack on the fact your business idea will surely take time to catch on, and starting up can seem even further out of reach.

You are a perfect candidate to become a part-time entrepreneur.

While not ideal for every young trep — jumping head first into the start-up pool can be a preferred route — getting the business up and running before letting go of a regular paycheck may be the best course. Here are six ways to make the transition into entrepreneurship a smooth one:

• 1. Find balance. Of course, this is what being a part-time entrepreneur is all about. Can you start up and maintain your commitment to your full-time responsibilities? If you get caught up in your business to the point that your full-time job suffers, people will notice and it will cost you opportunities and, potentially, the job itself.

• 2. Be patient. As a part-time entrepreneur, you simply can’t move forward with your new business at the same pace as those who can work on theirs full-time. And even full-time entrepreneurs never have enough hours in the day. Find the right pace for you so you can see progress without completely wearing yourself out. Be patient; you may not be moving as fast as you would like, but forward is good.

• 3. Bank your profits. At some point, you will want to walk away from your job and be a full-time entrepreneur. The money you save now will enable you to take that step sooner. If you don’t need it to grow the business, then save it for your future, but be prepared to put it back into your new business as needed.

• 4. Set flexible goals. As you build your business, you may find your day job getting in the way of your entrepreneurial goals. That’s OK. It’s what being a part-time entrepreneur is about. Watch out for a tendency to beat yourself up for spending too much time on your job at the expense of your business. Your energies will need to shift from one to the other as time goes on, and that’s OK.

• 5. Take yourself seriously. While you’re taking baby steps with your business, you and others may discount your plans because your progress is slow. Don’t let timing affect your long-term commitment. Find ways to remind yourself of what you’re working to accomplish. Don’t let others dismiss your goals. Remember that you can make this happen, it will just take longer.

• 6. Have an escape plan, if you want one. Do you want to be a part-time entrepreneur forever? That’s actually alright. Operating as a part-time entrepreneur may not have been your original plan, but if your business can succeed in your off hours and you enjoy your full-time job, why not?

• However, if your entrepreneurial plans include running your dream business full time, you need to define milestones and set goals that include walking away from your day job. What needs to be in place in terms of infrastructure, sales, product development or other criteria before you will be ready to quit?
  
  
  Cheers!
  
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(Video) Delatorro McNeal - The 5 Pillars Of Success

For over a decade, Delatorro L. McNeal, II has been transforming the lives of people from all walks of life. As an internationally renowned Professional Speaker and Best Selling Author, Delatorro has spoken in 45 of the 50 US states and  He is the celebrated author of, Caught Between a Dream and a Job: How to Leave the 9-to-5 behind, and Step into the Life You’ve Always Wanted.

In this video Delatorro McNeal breaks down the 5 Pillars of Success.

The 5 Pillars Of Success – Powerful Advice For Entrepreneurs

Cheers!

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16 Reasons Why It's So Important To Follow Your Dreams

The 16 Reasons Why It It's So Important To Follow Your Dreams

1. The secret of living is giving, if you follow your dreams then you will have something worth sharing with others, hope, inspiration and a meaning to live, and that to me, is a great contribution.

2. Chasing your dreams will develop your courage. Courage is your fuel to achieve amazing success in life, follow your dreams and exercise courage. In sure enough time you will be unstoppable.

3. There is a reason why as kids we loved magic and dreams. Stop chasing your dreams and you will forget how it feels to live hopeful and young.

4. Great dreamers grow to be independent, learning that they can make a difference all by themselves.

5. Dreams can distract you from the negative events in life. You will weigh up what is more important, your dreams or the drama. Drama seems obsolete when you are passionate about following your dreams.

6. It gives you something to share and inspire your kids with, you have led by example that anything is possible when you put your mind to it.

7. Through accomplishing your dreams you will come to appreciate the experience of failure and know that failure is just part of success and that it wasn’t really all that bad as it was all worth it in the end.

8. Regret is a terrible thing, and a dream is powerful enough to bring you regret if you don’t take the chance to at least follow it.

9. Because you are never too old to dream. Age means nothing when we know what we want.

10. You become an interesting person, you show others you have meaning, direction and purpose.

11. The unknown of following your dreams may spark a little fear, this is okay though because a little fear is known to make you feel more alive.

12. It is fun proving the world wrong, so why would you follow the status quo?

13. The more you chase and accomplish your dreams the more the lines of the boundaries that the world puts in front of us fade, as we learn that any and everything is possible.

14. When you accomplish your dream, you are the first to see it happen. You can share your accomplishments with the rest of the world but you where there in the front row on a single chair to experience the magic that unfolded.

15. Your dreams have no limits, you are the creator of your dreams, big or small. When this is understood, you are able to design a way to favour you plan and accomplish your end goal.

16. A dream is strong enough to define you, once accomplished you prove to others they have no say in who you can and can’t be.

Cheers!

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5 Myths About Being An Entrepreneur

5 Myths About 

Being An

Entrepreneur

If you’re looking for a feel good post about why you should quit your secure 9 to 5 job and become an entrepreneur, this is not the post for you. Being an entrepreneur is great and I wouldn’t trade it for a desk job, but there are some things aspiring (or existing) entrepreneurs should know.

#1 You’re going to be insanely successful. You are not the next Mark Zuckerberg. Sorry, you’re not and I’m not. If you have the idea that you’re going to sit down and create the next Facebook and be worth billions of dollars in seven to 10 years, it’s not going to happen. Am I saying it’s not good to dream big? No. I’m saying there is only one Facebook and only one Mark Zuckerberg in this world.

#2 Entrepreneurs have a very flexible work schedule. They can work three to four hours a day and have plenty of time to goof off. I know I’m not alone when I say that entrepreneurs don’t have the luxury of ending our workday abruptly at 5pm. When you own your own company or work for someone who does, you have to put in the extra hours and the extra effort to make things happen. If you aren’t ready to work some pretty long days, you probably aren’t cut out for being an entrepreneur.

#3 Entrepreneurs can take off when they want — after all, you’re the boss, right? Remember all those times you used to be able to party on random nights of the week or just take off for a weekend with your friends? Not if you want to keep your business afloat the first year (or two, three, four, etc). Now I’m not saying you won’t ever get time off, but most entrepreneurs live, eat and breathe their businesses and a lot of times partying gets pushed to the wayside. What’s more important: Doing keg stands with college buddies or generating income so you can pay bills the next couple months?

#4 Working from home means you’ll have more time for your relationship, your pets, taking care of your home, etc. Wrong. Because you work from home, it’s like you live in this constant state of never finishing anything. You start cleaning the dishes and then think of a great idea or feature for your company. Instead of taking your significant other out to a nice meal, you ask to get drive thru so you can get back to work quicker. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked over at my dog and it looks like he’s crossing his legs because he needs to go outside (and I love my dog to death!).

#5 Everyone wants to have your job. I’m guessing it’s because people genuinely don’t love their jobs, but they think you have this perfect setup where you get to work and play all day long. I always hear things like “At least you don’t have to deal with a commute” or “I have so many worthless meetings and calls, you’re lucky”. Do you want to trade the last three days I worked 18 hours and had to go above and beyond to appease clients? No, no you don’t.

For all the starving entrepreneurs out there, keep fighting the good fight. We’re all doing things we love and enjoy, and that’s what matters. I may not be building the next Facebook, but I am excited about controlling my own destiny and knowing the harder I work, the more results I see.

Cheers!

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Top 5 reason why you should consider Multi Level Marketing this 2012

Top 5 reason why you should consider Multi Level Marketing this 2012

What and why are the most common questions that you will always encounter when people hear the word “Multi Level Marketing” or “Networking”. 

But believe it or not, even if people say “I know that already” the underlying factor that binds all potential clients is they don’t really know much about it in the first place. Some may have an idea but bottom-line is this people don’t have the correct and valued information about the industry and how it can help them, that’s why they don’t see its potential or value.

So what do people know? Most of the time, people speak  out of the context from what other people told them and sadly most of this second or 3^rd hand information are already subjective rather than objective. Some even talk about the industry yet they haven’t tried it or succeed in it, so that’s not a reliable source of information. As I was advice by my mentor early in my career, pay your respects to other people’s opinions yet at the end of the day, if it will not help you get your goals or targets, disregard it. It does make sense; simply put it, if you wanted to be a successful business man, entrepreneur, dancer or what even tickles your fancy, you listen to those who succeeded in their career not to those who failed.

So why would you consider Network Marketing as an alternate career or source of income? There are technically 3 ways to earning money:

 1^st is you working for another someone else or what we a being an employee.  This is a good idea, if you want to retire at the age of 60, depend of Social security and start building your dreams from here coming from your retirement pay. Statically speaking this was and sadly still the trend for some people.  But there are some people who are able to make it from these demographics but sadly it’s too low and how? They invest their savings so bottom line they still don’t just focus on being an “employee”

Question is, if you can earn and starts early then retire younger would that sounds like a better plan?

2^nd Become a Professional like a Doctor or Engineer. Though, this requires a lot of time in studies, masteral’s and trainings not to mention that you’re paying huge sums of money as tuition or fees. Are you even aware that some Nurse undergoing OJT are required to pay a fee just to do their required OJT? That was not the case before. Of course, this is a good investment and plan as well some even calls this passion and that’s great but I have met a lot of people who struggle financially doing their passion.

3^rd Is to have your own business or become an Entrepreneur. This could have the highest potential return and key to that Freedom may it be financial and/or time. But remember, in traditional business or any business there are always risk involved as well as large amounts of money to start up your own.

So let’s look into an alternative that you can do while juggling your career that won’t eat a lot of your time and jeopardize what remains of your social life, if not we can improve it.

So you’re asking me “WHY NETWORK MARKETING again?” Let cite Top 5 reasons why you should consider the industry like myself and make a better 2012 compared to your yearly routine. By the way, these are proven and well known facts that we encounter every day.

1.       Recession or Unemployment – This is a proven crisis even in the US and is here to stay. Downsizing, redundancy issues and retrenchment to save resources and limit cost. Some are even moving into technology to increase productivity and unfortunately reduce labor cost.

Here in the Philippines, from my previous industry, these are common practices in the BPO industry. Yes, you may say there are a lot of other companies but were looking at stability of income and long term goals; nobody wants a short term day in day out life anyway.

When you consider a Networking career, yes, you will still start from scratch or basics moving up but the advantage is seen in the principle of Leverage and Exponential growth (I’ll discuss this on a separate article) and as the topic relates, there is no lay off in Networking. The more you work here, the more it gives back. How? A proven effective system and support structure that is not talent or metrics base like your old job.

2.       Network Marketing is the only wealth generating business that does not require you to give up your life savings but still generate large sums of money – Like as mentioned above, this boils down to a proven and effective system. To make it easier to understand, lets cite the example of franchising a successful establishment. Let’s say McDonalds, it’s very popular and guaranteed working because of the System that you need to follow.  In a day, (I forgot the projected earnings that I read before in an article) let’s say it earns 100k, that’s a huge amount but what most people don’t know is the 100k is not your net income since there are the overhead expenses and don’t forget the royalty fee’s your paying for the brand name. NOT TO MENTION! If you have 5 million and more to invest in MCdo in the 1^st place. For the average “Pinoy” or employee, that’s impossible.

But in Network Marketing your 8,900 pesos, will give you the same capability like those businesses to earn. It gives you the proven & effective systems to earn twice that amount even as much as 360,000 minus overhead expenses. How? Because you’re leveraging on the System not your talents or skills and at the same time leveraging on a mutual and beneficial partnership between you and your business partners. Not to mention, at this age of social media , you have the power of social online networking at the tips of your fingers.

3.       There will always be Inflation – why bother with circumstances that you can’t control rather let’s focus on what is within your reach of influence or action, your financial capability.

-          Reduce your expenses – learn necessity from luxury, even the rich will tell you “ it doesn’t mean you can buy it, you should”

-          Raise your Financial capability – Don’t just rely on your job, at the end of the day your just a number better than the last person. There is no stability in your boss

-          Make your money work for you – Be Smart, let money work for you rather than you working for money. Invest , you will be surprised when your revenue from network marketing has surpass your basic salary and becomes more stable.

4.       Power of compounding – This might as well be leverage in action. As John Rockefeller said “I would rather earn 1% off a 100 people’s efforts than 100% of my own efforts.”

       How? This is how large corporation grow, through the   collective production of employees.

And it’s the same concept with network marketing because you double your effort every       time you sponsor another business partner into your organization. Some will perform less or some will perform more, nevertheless you multiply yourself.

5.       The opportunity to work with “Problem Solvers” – Entrepreneurs are “problem solvers” by nature. They find the solution or supply to the demands of the trend. If you are to start in any business, it’s always wise to work with the “Problem Solvers” who are in the lead of the trend not in the middle or tail. Getting the chance to work with these people not only increases your success rate if not guarantee it but gives you the opportunity to learn, grow and become a “Problem Solver” as well. This is the difference of working with them or for them.

The list may go on but in a nutshell, these are the most common reasons “Why” and you might encounter a lot more. So why 2012 again? Because there is no perfect time in Network Marketing other than today. You will be surprised that a few years back, you had a chance of MLM but didn’t decide on it, now here it is again. Fact is MLM will grow with or with you and it will make a better life for somebody you know so better start with you.

 Cheers!

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